On Oct 21, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) raided family homes in Monterey County by pretending to be local police, including wearing jackets that said "POLICE" on them, knocking on people's doors pretending that they just wanted to ask some questions, and then arresting them without any warrants. The two men are fathers of U.S. citizens. One is a grandfather. They have lived in the United States since 1989 and 2005.

On October 27 the Santa Cruz City Council voted unanimously to support the creation of a permanent garden owned by the City, on the site of the current Beach Flats Community Garden. Community members have applauded this as a great start, but the Seaside Company, owner of the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk, has plans to take part of the garden for other uses unless the City intervenes by November 13.

A state-convened working group is recommending a series of initial steps toward reducing whale entanglements in crab gear in California, including more monitoring and retrieval of lost fishing gear. The Dungeness Crab Fishing Gear Working Group was convened in September after the Center for Biological Diversity and other groups found that whale entanglements in 2014 and 2015 had reached historic highs.

To mark the National Day of Protest Against Police Brutality, community members in Salinas rallied in front of city hall on October 22, where the family members of Jose Velasco, Frank Alvarado, and Angel Ruiz all spoke. Ruiz and Alvarado were among five unarmed Latino men killed in separate incidents in 2014 during encounters with the Salinas Police Department. Velasco was severley beaten by a group of Salinas police officers in 2015.

Governor Jerry Brown this October signed two bills that will require more frequent oil pipeline inspections and improve oil spill response, but the questionable "marine protected areas" created under the privately-funded Marine Life Protection Act (MLPA) Initiative still fail to protect the ocean from pollution, fracking, oil drilling, military testing, corporate aquaculture and all human impacts other than sustainable fishing and Tribal gathering.

Take Back Santa Cruz (TBSC) claims to be a non-profit group dedicated to safety issues in the city of Santa Cruz, and that they have no ideological direction. The truth is that TBSC has been the grassroots arm to many of the recent laws criminalizing homelessness in the city as well as the force behind proposed RV bans, forced closure and relocation of a needle exchange service, and a stay away order law from public parks.

Donald Thomas Miller II, age 39, was shot and killed on October 6 by Zach Reed, an officer with the Monterey Police Department. According to police reports, Miller was acting irrationally in downtown Monterey, police were called, and Reed killed him because Miller was in possession of a weapon, which turned out to be non-operational.

Federal prison sentences were handed down October 2 for the three remaining defendants in the Kettle Falls Five case in Washington State. They were charged with multiple federal felonies after a 2012 raid on the family’s personal cannabis garden. The case has received national attention as an example of federal interference with state-qualified medical cannabis patients. Lobbying by Larry Harvey, a defendant in the case who died last month from cancer, was instrumental in getting Congress to restrict Department of Justice enforcement in states with medical cannabis laws.

Students, union members and the Raging Grannies all questioned the role of the hi-tech industry in the climate movement at a rally held next door to Google headquarters on October 14. The Raging Grannies specifically called out firms Google and Facebook since both companies joined with climate change deniers when they became members of the climate denying lobbying group ALEC.

On October 11, a group of indigenous people held a sacred ceremony and observance on the historic Gill Tract Farm to honor the land and the ancestors who lived on the land for over 10,000 years. The gathering was convened by the Indigenous Land Access Committee (ILAC) — a group of Ohlone and other native people who envision reclaiming land stolen from them, and restoring spiritual and cultural lifeways in solidarity with indigenous people on every continent harmed by colonization.

As advocates of Senate Bill 350 were celebrating the signing of the amended renewable energy bill by Governor Jerry Brown, a major appointment to a regulatory post in the Brown administration went largely unnoticed. In a classic example of how Big Oil has captured the regulatory apparatus in California, Governor Jerry Brown announced the appointment of Bill Bartling who has worked as an oil industry executive and consultant, as district deputy in the Division of Oil, Gas and Geothermal Resources at the embattled California Department of Conservation.

A "Stingray" is a device that simulates a cellphone tower and intercepts all phone traffic in its range. A new California law set to go into effect this January requires most state and local agencies to conduct a public hearing and to create a privacy policy before acquiring a Stingray or equivalent device. But on Tuesday, October 13, the Alameda County Board of Supervisors is scheduled to consider whether to approve a request by the Alameda County District Attorney to accept money from the state to acquire an upgraded Stingray known as a "Hailstorm." If approved, and if the purchase is consummated before the new year, the new Stingray law would not apply.
UPDATE: The decision on approving the grant money for a Stingray upgrade was postponed to an indefinite date, probably December.

As Jerry Brown continues to support the expansion of environmentally destructive fracking in California, the Governor on October 7 signed renewable energy legislation, SB 350, by Senate President pro Tempore Kevin de León. The bill was amended under heavy political pressure by the Western States Petroleum Association, the most powerful corporate lobbying group in Sacramento. Before being amended, Senate Bill 350 called for a 50 percent reduction in petroleum use in cars and trucks by 2030.

Receiving scant attention from marijuana legalization advocates and just about zero attention in the national media, voters in Ohio will be deciding on a controversial marijuana legalization initiative this November that “Grants a monopoly for the commercial production and sale of marijuana." It is a cautionary tale to which the backers of California’s multiple marijuana legalization initiatives might want to pay close attention.

Activists in Santa Cruz are moving in to their 13th week of sleep protests held at city hall organized to protest the criminalization of people experiencing homelessness, and to work toward the repeal of the local camping and sleeping bans. Dozens of "Freedom Sleepers", as many of them call themselves, have held their ground and stayed the night at city hall despite regular visits by officers with the Santa Cruz police department, as well as First Alarm security guards hired by the city, who have made arrests and issued protesters dozens of citations.

Small cascades of pristine water rush out of the hillside at Big Springs, the headwaters of the Sacramento River, as they converge in a shallow pool located in the Mount Shasta City Park. On September 26, Caleen Sisk, Chief and Spiritual Leader of the Winnemem Wintu Tribe, and hundreds of environmentalists and activists from all over California and Oregon held a rally, the “Water Every Drop Sacred” event, in the scenic park. After the rally ended, Sisk and tribal members led a march and protest of 160 people to the water bottling plant.

Over 2000 protesters from many different Indian American communities joined together outside the SAP Center in San Jose on September 27 to counter Prime Minister Narendra Modi's vision of "Digital India" and Hindutva. They raised many issues with Modi's leadership, ranging from forced conversions to Hinduism, Internet surveillance, arrest of political bloggers, harassment of human rights activists, blind eye to rapes, dispossession of small farmers, rewriting of Indian history, and the 2002 Gujarat massacre.

Despite widespread objections, Junipero Serra was canonized on September 23 at the National Shrine in Washington DC by Pope Francis during his US visit. On September 27, as a parish celebration of the sainthood of Junipero Serra was scheduled to take place at the Carmel Mission Basilica, a statue of Serra was toppled over and paint was smeared on two grave sites, as well as on signs with the name of Serra, and on the doors of the mission. One mission artifact was inscribed with the statement, "Saint of Genocide".

On September 17, the first move-in day for Fall quarter at UC Santa Cruz, students and community members at the main entrance of campus displayed signs opposing Senate Concurrent Resolution 35 (SCR 35), which was introduced this year in the California Senate. On its surface SCR 35 is legislation that addresses anti-Semitism on the University of California campuses, but critics caution the measure has the potential to limit the free speech activities of those seeking justice for Palestine.

On September 12, about 60 people showed up outside Uncle Sam's Liquors in Richmond to remember Pedie Perez who was shot dead at that location on September 14, 2014 by Richmond police officer Wallace Jensen. Although Jensen claims that Pedie had tried to take his gun, witnesses dispute this and the store's surveillance video shows that after a struggle on the ground Jensen got up and backed away with his gun still holstered. He then shot Pedie from about six feet away.

September 22nd was the Pope's first day of a historic visit to the United States. Placards calling upon the religious leader to "stand with us for workers' rights" were amongst those carried by protesters at the Hyatt Santa Clara, which is adjacent to Tech Mart. Hyatt's aggressive use of subcontractors allows it to pay poverty wages to workers.

In the classic movie Chinatown the villain and the head of the water district played by the late John Huston says, "Either you bring the water to L.A. or you bring L.A. to the water". In a scenario eerily reminiscent of a scene in the film, when the LA Department of Power and Water buys up land in the Owens Valley in order to seize Owens River water, the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California is considering purchasing land in the imperiled Delta to "bring L.A. to the water".

Dan Rush, a former union organizer for United Food and Commercial Workers Local 5, was recently named in a federal arrest warrant that alleges he engaged in bad-faith negotiations with cannabis dispensary owners while acting in his capacity as a union official. Rush is also accused of holding a private financial interest in a medical cannabis company seeking a dispensary permit in Oakland in 2010.

For three Fridays in a row, boisterous members and allies of the Mountain View Tenants Coalition marched passed City Hall to the busy intersection at El Camino Real to push for a moratorium on rent increases. Inspired by the recent success of the East Bay city of Richmond, Mountain View residents are hoping to gain some legal protection for renters in one of the Bay Area's most costly cities, home to hi tech giants including Google.

Despite a record drought in California, agribusiness tycoons Stewart and Lynda Resnick are pushing a controversial tunnel plan to benefit their almond and cash crop empire. The plan, called the "California Water Fix" and formerly known as the Bay Delta Conservation Plan, would imperil northern California fish populations. The average California household could be charged as much as $5000 to pay for the project, according to Food and Water Watch. On August 19, protesters took their complaints to the street, demonstrating in front of the Resnick's agribusiness headquarters in Los Angeles.